I'll be interested in seeing the numbers for the months after PoP, since this ends with PoP's publication.

Kinare

05-14-2003, 05:31 AM

It looks to me like this goes through the end of March or so... And look at the subscription rates of AO and DAOC roughly where PoP came out. Very nice link... Too lazy to see where they got the data though =p

Jigsaw

05-14-2003, 05:35 AM

The success of post-EQ UO only proves my point that EQ is here to stay. You always hear people saying "EQ is dying!" We've heard that now for 4 years. EQ may shrink, I wouldn't be surprised to see subscription levels drop as low as 200,000 in a few years, but it will not become an unsustainable game for SOE. 200,000+ certainly are enough players even to sustain expansions every now and then.

Viva EQ!

Scirocco

05-14-2003, 05:43 AM

EQ definitely has some legs and likely will go on for several years, just as UO has. It will require periodic expansions, though, to maintain some vigor(note that UO continues to release expansions).

Kytelae

05-14-2003, 06:09 AM

And he notes in fact that with the recent AOS expansion, UO broke 250,000 players for the first time. It's still an expanding market, to some degree.

Panamah

05-14-2003, 06:31 AM

<blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>Firstly, I rely on the companies and employees themselves to provide the bulk of the data. The numbers they give could be completely made up, and as Enron taught us, even financial reports could be misleading. However, given that none of claims seem highly outrageous, and that all companies are equally capable of lying, it would seem that the numbers given are pretty close to the truth. There is probably some minor fudging involved when a company wants to claim a major milestone, rounding up to the nearest 5K or 10K increment. But at the very least, the relative comparison between MMOGs is retained, even if individual data points may be off 10% or more.
[/quote]